Exploring North Wales With a Caravan Holiday

During the Black Friday sales in December last year I was on the hunt for a family holiday for 6 of us during the school summer holidays. Knowing Chase was having a week with his Dad meant accessible accommodation wasn’t necessary and we had a much larger range of options available to us. In the end I snagged a bargain 4 nights with Hoseasons staying in a 5* holiday park at New Pines Holiday Park for 6 costing £310 for all of us.

Accommodation

To keep costs down we stayed in a 2 bedroom caravan with room for sleeping an extra 2 in the lounge. Having previously only experienced caravan accommodation of the accessible type we were a little surprised at just much was fit into such a small space! The caravan was clean throughout and our keys came in a lovely little suitcase shaped tin with vouchers and details of the holiday’s parks. The nicest thing about the caravan was the kitchen, the kitchen was well equipped and we even had a little welcome pack with tea, coffee, milk, washing up liquid and cleaning cloths waiting for us. Not to mention there was a full size washing machine in the caravan – which was great as Harper had thrown up all over herself and her car seat on the journey across to Wales.

We were a little taken aback by the amount of space in the bedrooms and bathroom for even basic things like getting dressed. As a large family we’re quite used to living on top of each other but this was something else. I couldn’t even walk down the side of the bed without turning sideways in the kids room. However I can’t forget that I booked the cheapest caravan possible, the caravan was well furnished (tv’s in every bedroom!) and clean so it’s the size that suffered for the price.

Park Facilities

The park has it’s own indoor swimming pool, laundrette, restaurant, evening entertainment and mini shop at reception as well as a very large playpark with tennis courts. The only real facilities we used was the playpark which Brooke and Harper thoroughly enjoyed. The mini shop in reception was only open during reception hours. However the location of the park though meant it was only a short drive to the local supermarket which was open for much longer hours to get any necessities.

The holiday park only has a few rental properties and the rest of the caravans were all owned. I think because of this the holiday park was very well looked after and the area’s around the other caravans were beautifully landscaped by the owners.

Location & Surrounding Area

New Pines Holiday Park is a short drive away from the seafront in Rhyl North Wales. It’s location we found made it the perfect base for exploring North Wales which is why we selected it in the first place.

Llandudno

Llandudno is a fantastic place to visit only half an hour way, a seaside town with a large pier and home to both the Little and Great Orme. We visited all 3 of these during our stay and was blown away by the natural beauty of the areas as well as how much there was to do for the kids.

The Great Orme features a mile long cable car, a tramway, 3000 year old ancient mines, a ski slope and toboggan run, mini golf and a playpark at the summit of the Great Orme.

Snowdonia

To explore more of the beautiful scenery then an hour and a half drive to Snowdonia is a must. There are stunning driving routes taking you past Mount Snowdon and quaint villages such as Beddgelert which has the legendary story of Gellert the hound.

When the children are older we are planning on walking up Mount Snowdon. There is also a Mountain railway which has been running since 1896 which will take you to the summit. Pre-booking for this is essential though, it’s impossible to turn up and get tickets on the day (as we discovered).

If you’d like to learn more about the history of the area then the Slate museum is an excellent and free place to visit in Snowdonia. With ample parking outside, live blacksmithing demonstrations as well as a playpark with a zipline this was a hit with all of us.

If adrenaline is your thing then Zip World has the worlds longest and fastest zipline in Snowdonia, as well as an alpine forest coaster and Bounce Below – an enormous underground net adventure set in an old slate cavern. Activities at these sites starts from ages 3 and up. When the youngest children are older we are planning to come back and try most of these out.

Anglesea

Finally the one place less than hour away that I’d recommend visiting is ‘that village with the really long name’. Dan and I decided we couldn’t drive all the way to North Wales and not stop for a picture at the railway at Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch located on the island of Anglesea. It has probably the most awesome gift shop we’ve visited there too!

We had a fantastic time exploring North Wales and really felt we could have spent a lot longer in the area as there is so much to do. We have decided that we will be returning one day to explore more. The one thing we did find is that a lot of what we did and the areas we went would not have been suitable for Chase and his care needs. However with some careful planning I’d love to be able to bring him along to our next adventure in North Wales as I think he would absolutely love to get to the top of Mount Snowdon.

I’ll be looking for bigger accommodation next time we visit, although this can be hard to do on a budget. I’m yet to use sites like Airbnb but think they may be the way forward especially for finding something of a reasonable price during the school summer holidays. Have you visited North Wales before? I’d love to hear your favourite place to visit there.